Finding the Church of Christ

Growing up in a family that believed in the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, but who did not do much to actually practice those beliefs, it took me a long time to discover what it truly means to be a Christian. There were times as kids that we were brought to church services, and even a short period where we would attend regularly, and we were taught to pray and give thanks and even to sing praises at home. I even recall a time that my mom and her sister tried to start Bible studies at the house for my cousins and my siblings and I, but that also only lasted for a time.

It wasn't until I was an adult that I truly started to discover what Christianity was about and having a thirst for God. I remember sitting in the little run down trailer my husband and I owned one evening and thinking how badly I wanted to start being the person that I knew God wanted me to be. My husband must have been working, because I remember being home alone and not having a vehicle. The desire was so strong in me, however, that I decided to walk up to the church that was up at the end of the road on the corner. This was a good thirty minute walk or more and it was a hot evening, but it was worth it. I arrived a good hour early so I sat down on the church steps and waited. The preacher walked over sometime after, before the evening Bible study, and he greeted me and I told him about myself. He seemed surprised in a good way that I walked to church, happy to see such an enthusiasm for God. This happened to be my first dealings with the Church of Christ. I had never even known about the Church of Christ before, and the only church I could remember going to on a regular basis was an Assembly of God that we had attended for a few months when I was a child.

As I started going to the Church of Christ regularly, I started to see the differences in this church from other churches I had attended. They seemed to be much stricter in their beliefs, but less face it, your religion is not something you want to be casual or careless with. There were a lot of things I had been taught growing up that didn't make sense to me that I found out were actually wrong and went against what the Bible said. I had a lot of unlearning to do so that I could learn the truth of God's Word. After a time of attending, both my husband and I were baptized into the Church of Christ. I was so happy to be living the Christian life, doing my best even at home to try to please God.

But, much to my shame, things happened in my life and I let myself fall away from the church. After I fell away and back into the world, it was a good couple of years before I went to church again.

It started to weigh on me as mother when my oldest was two and my other being just a couple of months that I already wasn't raising my children in the way that God wanted me to. He had given me a grand responsibility, and I knew I wasn't upholding those responsibilities the way that I should. I started going to the Church of Christ in the town I had been living in at the time. Unfortunately, I didn't get to attend very long before we abruptly had to move. Having no place else to go, we stayed with my parents who were in a town over an hour away from the one we were living in. For awhile I still made every effort to continue to go to the same church, but it became too much to do so. Instead of finding a closer church as I should have, I simply fell away again.

It was another year before I started regularly going to church again.

When I started to go to church in the new town that I live in, the church I chose was a Baptist church. I liked it for it's size, it's many classes, and the wonderful people there. I had fallen away from the Church of Christ and went back to my previous ways of thinking.

My husband and I had a friend who was very dear to us. He was a great example of a young Christian man. Never had I met someone that age so devoted to God. He attended church regularly, went to Bible camps across the nation, and he never smoked, drank, or even swore; no, he was not perfect, but he did his best to live his life in a way that would honor God and he did a much better job of it than most people I know.

On April 17th, 2013, that friend was taken from us after a heavy rain caused the river going over his property to overflow across the bridge he had to cross. Losing someone who you are very close to is a life-changing experience. We could not know him and not be affected by him, we could not lose him and not be changed by the loss. We met his family whom we hadn't really had the pleasure to meet before. Though we had known him for a couple years, we had only gotten to be close to him for half that time. I was sitting at his family's house when his brother invited me to attend a gospel meeting with them. They were members of the Church of Christ, just as their son had faithfully been.

After attending a few of the meetings with them, I started being a member of the Church of Christ again. I was restored to the church just a few weeks ago. I am happy as I feel like I am back to where I need to be with God. My husband and I are now setting the right example for our small children. I hope to never fall away from the church, or my faith, again. Thank you God for being the God of second chances.

I am writing this post, and this little bit of religious background, because I have started to to do some really insightful online Bible studies and I plan to share the notes I take from these studies on my blog. I know that the name of Jesus is offensive to a lot of people, but His is the name that offers salvation. I hope that there will be those that will benefit from the lessons that I am going to post. And for those of you who do not want to read them, there will be no hard feelings. All of my posts are clearly marked for reference and you can simply skip over anything you don't want to see. :)